'Alert' 1881-2

156 COLLECTIONS FROM MELANESIA.
differ in comparatively unimportant details, of a kind which are
probably adaptive.
(jS) There is a marked tendency to the development of a small
number of short cirri *.
(y) And ten species have lost the cirri altogether.
(?) Of the eleven species the formula of no two is exactly the
same.
1. Antedon adeonae.
Comatula adeonse, /. Milller, Gattung Comatula, p. 15 1.
A white line, which extends along the middle of the radials, the
rest of which is of a reddish purple, is continued for a short though
varying distance along each of the arms.
There is a curious error in connexion with this species which
does not seem to have been noticed. Lamarck described it as
" C. radilS pinnatis denis &c. ;" de Blainville, while quoting Lamarck,
refers also to his own figures in his ' Atlas ' (pi. xxvi.) ; in this
reference he is followed by J. Miiller and by the editors of the
second edition of Lamarck. The figures, however, when referred to
are seen to be those of a species with twenty arms and with cirri
nearer thirty than twenty. It is not perhaps necessary at this
distance of time to waste time in inquiring what species it is that
de Blainville has there figured.
Port Curtis and Port Denison.
2. Antedon milberti.
Comatula (Alecto) milberti, J. Miiller, p. 19.
The rich supply of this species in the present collection % amply
justifies the doubts which Mr. Carpenter has expressed to me as to
the exactness of the locality (North America) ascribed by Miiller to
this species.
Port MoUe ; Port Denison ; Prince of Wales Channel ; Torres
Straits.
3. Antedon pinniformis.
P. H. Carpenter, Notes Lexjd. Mus. iii. p. 180.
Dundas Strait, N.W. Australia.
* So far as we know at present, c rarely appears i i the formula of an AcHno-
metra ;
in words, the cirri are rarely very numerous (more than 30) or very long
(with more than 40 joints).
t The essay on Comatula, the pagination of which is here quoted from its
separate copy, was published in 1849 in the ' Abhandl.' of the Academy of
Berlin for 1847, where it occupies pp. 237-265.
\ It is also well represented in a collection of Mr. E. P. Eamsay's, of the
Australian Museum, Sydney.